Monday, 8 August 2016

The search for a new home

As a church Grace is looking for a new home. We've been renting the school hall we meet in for a few years and we have a very good relationship with the school, there is certainly no pressure from them for us to move on. But there are a number of push and pull factors that are propelling us to look for somewhere new; our Sunday school really needs a bigger space, our opportunities to serve the community are limited by hiring space, especially a school where mid week opportunities are curtailed, and we currently have someone in our extended church family who is effectively excluded from church because of the building we use. All of that has led us for the last few months to be praying for and searching for a new building.

However, the area we are in throws up a number of extra complexities. There are no other community spaces in Hayfield and renting another school wouldn't solve the problem of a base to serve the community from the rest of the week. We've contacted various offices that are for let and have been told they would not let or sell us any space as they don't want to go through the change of use process. So we have been in contact with Peel Holdings who own most of the land round here to ask if there is some land available they could gift or help us build a building on which we could use for the community outreach we want to do. As of yet we have heard little back and so we keep on praying. We have asked the local MP to use any contacts or influence she has, and again we keep on praying.

What can you pray for us, here's some pointers:

Pray that as a church we stay united and prayerful as we look to God to provide

Pray that we don't take our eyes off our mission of reaching the area with the gospel even while we wait.

Pray that our God would move those at Peel to provide a piece of land or a building

Pray that God would provide the finance we need to build that building and that he would be glorified through his people.